Editing Suspension of disbelief (section)

== Criticisms ==
Aesthetic philosophers generally reject claims that a "suspension of disbelief" can accurately characterize the relationship between people and "fictions". American philosopher [[Kendall Walton]] noted that if viewers were to ''truly'' suspend disbelief when viewing a [[horror movie]] and accept its images as absolute fact, they would have a true-to-life set of reactions that are impractical and contradict the safety of the leisure of viewing the movie. For instance, if this logic generally applied, then audience members would try to help endangered on-screen characters, or call authorities when witnessing on-screen murders.<ref>"[https://www.jstor.org/stable/2025831 Fearing Fictions]", Kendall L. Walton, [[JSTOR]] (''[[Journal of Philosophy|The Journal of Philosophy]]'', Vol. 75, No. 1 (01-1978), pp. 5–27). Retrieved 3 January 2007.</ref>

Not all authors believe that "suspension of disbelief" adequately characterizes the audience's relationship to imaginative works of art. {{nowrap|[[J. R. R. Tolkien]]}} challenged this concept in "[[On Fairy-Stories]]", choosing instead the [[paradigm]] of ''secondary belief'' based on inner [[consistency]] of reality: in order for the narrative to work, the reader must believe that what they read is [[Truth|true]] ''within'' the secondary reality of the [[fictional world]]. By focusing on creating an [[Fictional universe#Definition|internally consistent fictional world]], the author makes secondary belief possible. Tolkien argued that suspension of disbelief is only necessary when the work has failed to create secondary belief, saying that from that point on, the reader ceases to be immersed in the story and so must make a conscious effort to suspend their disbelief or else give up on it entirely.<ref>Tolkien, J. R. R. "On Fairy-Stories" in ''The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays'', George Allen & Unwin Press, 1983, pp. 109–61.</ref>